Chromebook. Any good (*in the real world)?

Three months ago I started to use Chromebook. Particular model is Lenovo N20 (as this was only available in Croatia at the moment, I am not sure is situation any better now, don’t think so).

Current system is 53.something. I don’t care too much about that. What it is important for me can be listed very easy.

Portability is very good. Battery lasts for hours. And hours more. Machine is very easy to carry along with you. Light and slim. Fits very easy between papers you already got in briefcase.

Reliability. Nothing to say here. It works without any problem. “Applications” are stable and just works.

Usability is good enough. It is not great but good enough. As there is no real office package but Google Docs for it you got what you got. And that is good enough for about 95 percent of my work (I am not sure about number, wild guess). I made quite a lot documents with it and all kind of materials without any problems. Office compatible documents to PDFs. Of course, you will NEVER manage to open AutoCAD on it or play games but machine is not intended to do such things. On the other hand machine got instant start. Just open it and it is ready for login. Everything is instant on it.

There are few things that some people mind find as a flaws. Internet connection is absolute must. Machine is not usable without it. I do not remember when I was last time somewhere w/o Internet access (actually I do, on airplane).

Next thing is printing. Just have in mind it is not as easy we are used to. Need some configuration. Nothing to serious or to worry about. It works good enough.

Beside that your documents is located on Google cloud. Nothing to worry about, really. Standard bs that it is not safe is not argument for me. If someone will ever want my particular documents he will get it. Wherever I try to hide it. As I said, nothing to worry about.

If I try to compare it with two other machines I use daily (Lenovo T540p and Lenovo Yoga 11) this one is a little bit different. I got no MS Office on it. I got no mail archive on it (I got all mails I ever received or sent). But that’s it.

Conclusion is not easy. Chromebook is absolutely enough for my everyday activity, either in office or at home. Some users will ask for more but in that case there are always Windows based notebooks. Same format, different look and feel. You can always choose and decide for yourself. It is not for everyone. Keep that in mind.

This little article is written on Chromebook Lenovo N20. No difference between it and “real” computer. Enough said.